Abstract

Changes in the direct gate tunneling current are measured for strained -channel metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistors(MOSFETs) on (100) wafers for uniaxial and biaxial stress. Decreases/increases in the gate tunneling current for various stresses primarily result from repopulation into a subband with a larger/smaller out-of-plane effective mass. Strain-induced changes in the valence band offset between Si and are also important but play a secondary role. Hole tunneling current is found to decrease for biaxial and uniaxial compressive stress and increase for biaxial tensile stress. The hole tunneling data is modeled using self-consistent solution to Poisson and Schrödinger’s equation, and a transfer matrix method.

Received 09 September 2005Accepted 20 December 2005Published online 31 January 2006

Acknowledgments:

The authors would like to thank the SRC, NSF (Grant No. ECS-0524316), and Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR), and Multi-disciplinary University Research Initiative (MURI) for funding this research.